State sacks council over ALP links, 'abuse'

By David Rood and Kate Lahey

16 September 2009 — 12:00am

THE Labor-controlled Brimbank Council has been sacked after a new investigation found the majority of councillors had abused their roles and the ALP was continuing to ''inappropriately influence'' the western suburbs council.

Administrators will run the council until 2012, after independent inspector Bill Scales found the councillors ''cannot provide good government'' and are incapable of improvement and reform.

Mr Scales also highlighted an attempt by a local ALP branch to influence the decisions of Labor councillors as an example of the ''destructive culture'' in Brimbank.

Mr Scales was appointed to monitor Brimbank in May after a scathing Ombudsman's report on the council found Labor figures, including senior state MPs, had inappropriately interfered in council business.

''I have concluded that the problems identified by the Ombudsman in his report are deep-seated and are still sustained within the Brimbank City Council,'' the Scales report found.

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''A number of councillors have shown by their actions little if any commitment to meeting these basic [governance] requirements or to understanding why they are necessary.''

The report found six of Brimbank's 11 councillors elected last year have been or are currently being investigated for inappropriate behaviour and recommended the Government suspend or dismiss the council.

The Opposition and the Greens seized on the report, saying it showed Labor was playing games with local government.

Among the inappropriate behaviour found by Mr Scales was an attempt by a councillor to get off a parking fine and the re-emergence of factional voting alliances among councillors.

He also found the St Albans branch of the ALP tried to inappropriately influence Labor councillors, effectively issuing them with ''instructions'' on the controversial issue of building new municipal offices.

But St Albans branch secretary Cheryl Congreve denied the branch had tried to exert undue influence, pointing out it had also written to former prime minister John Howard on a number of community issues.

Local Government Minister Richard Wynne said he had no choice but to sack the dysfunctional council.

''It is obvious when you read the report that some of the basic fundamentals of governance, some of these councillors simply don't understand,'' he said. But Mr Wynne denied any connection between the behaviour of the councillors and the ALP.

The last council dismissed by the State Government was the Glen Eira Council in 2005.

Brimbank mayor and ALP member Troy Atanasovski said his councillors were surprised and disappointed by the decision and denied the council had been improperly influenced by Labor.

''This is a new council, elected in November 2008, eight new councillors out of 11 and as far as I'm concerned [they] are all doing a fantastic job,'' he said.

''I think it's a political price, they've got the Brimbank Council as a scapegoat.''

Another councillor, Heidi Seitz, who is a relative of state Labor MP George Seitz, labelled the Government's decision as poor. ''I've never been contacted by any Labor figures in regards to council,'' she said.

Greens councillor Geraldine Brooks said it was ''astonishing'' that the undue influence of Labor MPs was being dealt with by the sacking of councillors.

''It's a sledgehammer approach … in an attempt to take the heat off Labor and state Labor's corruption,'' she said.

Mr Scales said he did not find any Labor MPs exerted influence on the council.

While the Victorian Local Governance Association said three years was too long to wait for an election, the Sunshine Residents and Ratepayers Association said the period was necessary to break down Labor's factional networks in Brimbank.

Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu said the Scales report showed Labor's destructive and corrupt culture was deeply entrenched in local government. ''You could conclude from this that the ALP should be sacked. This is the ALP's culture,'' he said.

Mr Scales has been appointed as temporary administrator, with a panel to be appointed to run the council until the 2012 elections.